U.S. job growth turned negative for the first time since April in the final month of 2020, as the pandemic that rocked the economy over the past year dealt yet another blow to the labor market.
The Labor Department released its December jobs report Friday morning, and here are the numbers compared to consensus estimates compiled by Bloomberg:
- Change in non-farm payrolls: minus 140,000 vs. 50,000-plus expected, and a revised 336,000-plus in November
- Unemployment rate: 6.7 percent vs. 6.8 percent expected and 6.7 percent in November
- Average hourly earnings, month-over-month: 0.8 percent vs. 0.2 percent expected and 0.3 percent in November
- Average hourly earnings, year-over-year: 5.1 percent vs. 4.5 percent expected, and 4.4 percent in November
December’s drop in payrolls widened the employment deficit in the labor market from before the pandemic, bringing the economy still more than 9.8 million payrolls short of its February levels. This came even as the payroll gains for each of October and November were upwardly revised by a combined 135,000.
Click here to see the full story from Emily McCormick at Yahoo Finance.
Heading into Friday’s report, consensus economists had braced for a further deceleration in job growth at the end of the year, with employment trends weakening as new virus-related restrictions dampened employment and businesses awaited support from Congress’s latest stimulus package.
